Burning Leaves
by Stumpilicious
Summary: Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura have just been put on a team together, but because of a last minute review by the Hokage, they aren't stuck with Kakashi. How will these three ninja learn under the Elite Jonin Asuma Sarutobi.


**Do I exist? In short, no. The naive bright-eyed fanfic author that you know and probably hated is gone. Now I'm here. And this is the last attempt at a story I will ever do. I've decided that a ninja of steel wouldn't work, Naruto is way too flexible to do that, and every other idea had major pitfalls, except for this one. So please, bear with me for a bit while I try to work out a schedule. So to everyone who used to like me, prepare for a good story, for those of you that haven't read my stories before. Enjoy, _Burning Leaves_!**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Naruto, I'd be filthy stinking rich and wouldn't have to do college. I'm in college, so I don't own Naruto**

Haruzin Sarutobi sat at his desk, smoking his pipe while he looked at the team assignments critically for a moment. Something seemed off. He was about to dismiss it and give up when he realized what it was. For some reason the sensei were mixed up. He put a genjutsu mistress, a master of trapping her opponents with a tracking team. He gave his son, an assault and tactical powerhouse to a team that had the heirs to the best trapping and destroying. He gave a man with a contract with tracking dogs to a team designed for assault. _'The damn council messed these up. I'm not changing the teams just so Sasuke has someone to help him with the Sharingan.' _He looked over the rest of the teams; at least the council didn't mess up the rest of them. He made sure to change the sensei to where he wanted them, stamped the page with his seal and called his assistant in to the room.

"Send this to the academy by tomorrow afternoon for the newest batch of genin." he spoke to the young woman.

"Hai, Hokage-sama."

Haruzin sighed. He hated having to do team assignments. He knew that over half of these kids would fail the test and quit the program, and even then, the ones that didn't would get placed later by a more lenient sensei and would never get beyond chunin, if they survived that long. He hoped that Naruto's team could pass. He knew that Asuma wasn't the hardest sensei, but he sure as hell wasn't easy.

Speaking of the blonde haired little menace, he was sitting in his apartment, unable to relax. He kept messing with his headband. It was HIS headband. HIS. He actually graduated.

_'I guess beating a chunin half to death is something that merits a promotion." _Naruto thought, with a smirk. He stayed up all night thinking about his ninja career. Rescuing princesses, hunting rouge ninja, rescuing princesses from rouge ninja... Needless to say, Naruto's imagination was going a bit wild.

The next morning, Naruto was on his way to the Academy, and all of the glares and looks of contempt made sense. Sort of. _'If I was the demon, I wouldn't let this shit slide. Seriously, I'm not the demon. And people call me stupid.' _Naruto was not stupid. Not in the slightest. He may not have been genius level, but he wasn't stupid. After thinking about it, he highly doubted that all of the questions on his tests were legitimate. How the hell was he supposed to know the answer to: "A shuriken is moving at a speed of 36.7 metres per second when it hits an enemy ninja in the stomach. The shuriken penetrates through the flesh a distance of 6.21 cm. What is the deceleration of the shuriken while moving through the flesh (assuming a uniform deceleration)?" Most chunin would have trouble with that, and Naruto wasn't even a genin.

Anyway, Naruto was walking to the building, unable to control his excitement. He was a ninja. An actual, 100%, ass-kicking ninja!

He entered the room with a huge grin. He went near the back of the room and sat down.

"Hey Naruto," Shikimaru came up, looking bored and lazy, as always. "Didn't you fail? What are you doing here?"

"Shikimaru," Naruto replied, sounding just as bored. "We both know you're not stupid. Look at my forehead." He pointed at his Hitai-ate with his thumb, and smiled.

"Troublesome..." Shikimaru grumbled.

Iruka walked in the room and all of the kids sat down and got quiet without any prompting or yelling. There was no noise and the tension was palpable.

"Congratulations to all of you." Iruka started. "You are now part of the shinobi force of Konohagakure no Sato, the village hidden in the leaves. From today on, you are expected to fight for, to kill for, and if necessary die for the village and its people. From today on, you are expected to remember what sets us apart from the other villages. The will of fire. The will of fire means never quitting. The will of fire means doing whatever is necessary to protect your teammates. The will of fire means to strive for, and surpass those above you. Remember, no matter what, your comrades are there for you. Today you will be separated into groups of three and under the guidance of a Jonin sensei. Team 1 is..."

Iruka started to name teams. Naruto just zoned out and thought of all of the people he could be paired with he'd be fine as long as he wasn't with-

"Team 7, Uzumaki, Uchiha, and Haruno..."

_ 'Fuck!' _Naruto thought. Great. He was with an annoying, fairly weak, if cute, girl, and the most egotistical jackass he'd ever met. Yeah, Sakura was cute, but she had no practical skills, and honestly, he gave up after what she did last week. Before the test, she hit him just for asking her out. A simple no would have worked, but she called him a baka and punched him in the face.

"...your sensei is Sarutobi Asuma, team 8 is..."

'_Sarutobi? Isn't that the Hokage's name? But the old man's name isn't Asuma. His son, maybe? Guess I'll find out.'_

"Ok, all the teams have been named. Now, I'll be leaving. Wait here for your sensei to show up. Goodbye, and do your best."

Iruka walked out. About 5 minutes later a bear of a man entered. He black hair, a goatee, a cigarette in his mouth, two black bracelets, one on each wrist, and had a sash with the Kanji for fire on it. Other than those he wore the standard jounin uniform, a dark green vest with black pants, and a black long-sleeved shirt underneath.

_ 'So...cool' _Naruto couldn't help but think. This man was big, looked extremely strong, and had a nonchalant air about him that made him seem eternally calm.

"Okay," He even sounded strong! He sounded gruff, but almost bored in his speech. "Team 7, I guess. Meet me at training ground 9 in twenty." He said, and left in a quick Shunshin.

Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura all sat there looking for a moment. Shrugged and took off.

At training ground 9, the three genin sat on the ground, in front of a smoking Asuma.

"Okay, give me some info on yourselves."

"Like what, sensei?" Sakura, asked. "Can you go first?

Asuma sighed. "Okay, I'm Asuma Sarutobi. Yes, my father is the Hokage. I'm 27 and a jounin. I was a member of the twelve ninja guardians and I currently have a thirty-five million ryo bounty in the black market." He finished, seemly oddly proud. "Besides that, I'm just an average jounin." He finished with a small chuckle.

The genin all had similar thoughts. _'Average? Pedigree like that, and a bounty that high? Nothing about that is average.'_

"So, Sakura, you go first."

"Oh, ok. My name is Haruno Sakura; I'm a twelve-year-old genin. Ummm, I don't come from a ninja family; I'm actually the first. I don't know what else to say really..."

"Some dreams or goals for the future?" Asuma suggested. He really wasn't good at dealing with kids.

"Well, my dream is to..." she began, then blushed and looked at Sasuke. "My goals for the future..." This start ended the same as the first

"Okay, Naruto, your turn." Asuma said, ignoring Sakura's obsession towards the young survivor.

"I'm Uzumaki Naruto, twelve year old genin, and my dream is to become the greatest Hokage ever, dattebayo!"

"...Ok. Next you, Sasuke."

"My name is Uchiha Sasuke. I am a twelve-year-old genin. My dream, no my ambition... is to kill a certain man..."

_ 'As expected...' _Asuma thought. "Okay. As you know you are now genin. Most sensei have a second test to make sure you're ready. I'm not going to do that. Most sensei test for teamwork, and I think that you'll develop teamwork. The thing is, thatt takes time. So, I'm going to test you all in a slightly different way. Give me an honest run-down of what you believe your skills to be. Any ninjutsu or genjutsu you know, how you believe your taijutsu, stealth and tracking skills to be. Things like that. Then I'll test you, and tear apart your over-inflated sense of worth. In two weeks, we'll go over it again, and if the training I recommend isn't followed to the letter, I fail you and the rest of your team. If you do what I tell you, then the rest of your team needs to as well. If you all follow my instructions, you'll be genin. So, Sakura, you first."

All of the genin looked nervous, even Sasuke. Sent back? Even if only one of them didn't follow directions. '_I guess that's what he meant by teamwork.'_

"Well, I know the academy three, _Bunshin no Jutsu, Kawarimi no Jutsu, _and _Henge no Jutsu._ I don't really know any genjutsu. Ummm… My taijutsu is average or a little below. My stealth and tracking are average as well…" She mumbled all of this looking down, a bit upset about it.

"Naruto?" Asuma asked.

"I know _Kawamiri no Jutsu, Henge no Jutsu, _and _Kage Bunshin no Jutsu._ I don't know any genjutsu. My taijutsu is pretty good I guess." Naruto realized that over-estimating himself would be stupid, even by his standards, while talking to Asuma. "My stealth is really good, and my tracking is probably average."

"Yeah right, dobe. How could a "ninja" in a bright orange jumpsuit be any good at stealth?" Sasuke felt the need to interject.

"Well Sasuke, Naruto was able to paint the entire Hokage Monument in broad daylight and it took 45 minutes for a group of chunin to catch him." Asuma explained. "Without the orange, he might be one of the stealthiest genin in the village." Naruto was beaming at this. "Now you."

"I know the acadmy three, _Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu_ (Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique) and _Katon: Hōsenka no Jutsu _(Fire Release: Phoenix Sage Fire Technique). My taijutsu is well above average, my stealth is pretty good, and my tracking is above average."

"All right," Asuma said as he cracked his neck and smiled. "who wants to start us off?"

**Wow, this took me almost a year, and it's a fairly short chapter. CURSE MY SHORT ATTENTION SPAN! Anyway, I'm going to continue working on this. I need some motivation to keep writing. I'm not holding chapters hostage, but I'll write more often if people show they like this story. Favorite, read and review. Tell your friends. If you notice any mistakes, do not hesitate to point them out. Please do. Oh, and so far, the story hasn't been too different from the common "Sensei swap" kind of stories, but I have plans. Evil plans. Mwahahahahahaha-cough cough. Anyway, stay tuned. Later.**


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